Daniel, at the very time when he is speaking of the seventh trumpet and the deftruction of the antichriftian empire. Here then the reader will be furnished with a new reason for concluding, that each of the prophets is speaking of the fame period and the fame events. Many, fays Daniel, shall be purified, and made white, and tried. The perfecutions of the faithful,' fays Mr. Lowth, are defigned for the trial of their faith, and 'purifying their lives.' And from the time that the daily facrifice fhall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh defolate fet up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days. That this computation cannot refer to the defolate ftate of Jerufalem and the profanation of its temple, appears evident, because a much longer period than 1290 years has elapfed, fince the city and the temple were exposed to the infults of Antiochus, or Titus, or Hadrian. The fame expreffions,' fays Mr. Lowth, made use of to describe Antiochus's perfe'cution, chap. xi. 31, are here applied to the defolations 'made by Antichrift, of which the former was a figure.' Mr. Wintle, to whom the public are indebted for a New Tranflation of Daniel, obferves, that the language is 'borrowed from the fervice of the Jewish temple, and applicable to the church of God in a variety of states and forms: that it is here particularly meant to have its 'illuftration during the times of the Chriftian church muft,' fays Mr. Wintle, ' be evident, not only from the 'whole series of the foregoing remarks, but becaufe the 'days cannot be taken in their strict sense, but must be understood for fo many years.' The fetting up of the Newton in like manner 'abomination of defolation,' bp. remarks, is a general phrafe 32. To fet up the abomi 31 See the note from Vitringa, at the bottom of p. 299. 3 Vol. II. p. 198. ་ nation that maketh defolate, fays Mr. Parker, is to establish antichriftian idolatries and fuperftitions, corrupt doctrine and unlawful worship;' and to take away the daily facrifice is to take away the true doctrine and 'worship inftituted by Chrift 33.' Here,' fays Mr. Lowth, the time allotted for the perfecutions of Anti'chrift, till the church be entirely cleanfed and purified, ' is enlarged from 1260 days, denoted by time, times, and 'an half, ver. 7, to 1290 days.' The prophet immediately adds, Bleffed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thoufand three hundred and five and thirty days. The ftate of mankind, at the end of this fecond period of 45 years, is to be fubftantially meliorated 34. 6 4 Mr. Bicheno, who calculates, that the first period which Daniel specifies, a time, and times, and an half, or the 1260 years, terminated in the year 1789, about which time alfo the refurrection of the witnefes and the earthquake in the Tenth Part of the city took place, confequently fuppofes, that the 1290 years will end in the year 1819, and the 1335 years in 1864. During the first of these periods, reaching from the year 1789 to 1819, he concludes, that all the feven vials are to be poured out; 6 a feafon," fays he, it is likely of great calamities, but efpecially to the enemies of Chrift's kingdom.-To 'gather and try the Jews preparatory to their converfion, to deftroy the remains of tyranny, and to purify 33 Parker on Dan. p. 109, 133. 'The offering daily facrifices is an expression very proper to denote the external of the Chriftian worship.' Comment. and Eff. ut fupra, fignature Synergus, vol. I. p. 473. 21 Bp. Newton fays, ' it is, I conceive, to these great events, the fall of • Antichrist, the restoration of the Jews, and the beginning of the glorious 'millennium, that the three different dates in Daniel of 1260 years, 1290 years, and 1335 years, are to be referred,' vol. III. p. 393. That the Jews will be restored to their own land in the course of 30 years, after the conclufion of the 1260, I do not, however, myself conceive to be at all probable. See Rom. xi. 25. and * and enlarge the Gentile church, will occupy forty-five ' years more. This is the time of which Daniel fays, Bleed is he that cometh to it, and which is the year '1864 35.' 6 Such is the ftatement of Mr. Bicheno. On the probability of it the reader muft judge for himself. Perfuaded that the fixing of future dates is a business of infinite delicacy, I fhould certainly myself have been very unwilling to have spoken in fo peremptory a manner respecting the epochas of Daniel, or on the period when any unaccomplished events are destined to happen. With refpect to the time when the proper millenniary period fhall commence, I do not allow myself even to conjecture; and, on the number of years which will be occupied in the effufion of the vials, I likewife conceive myfelf incompetent to give any opinion. Of this, however, I am perfuaded, that they will be poured out much fooner than many commentators have supposed. commentator. The following is the opinion of an ingenious French It' may be affirmed as certain and indu'bitable, that when the vials come to be poured out, there shall be no long distance between the pouring out ' of one of them, and the effufion of the reft. Because it is faid in the xth chapter, v. 6, that the angel fware that there fhould be time no longer. That is to fay, that 'there fhould be no more delay; that the judgments of God fhall overtake the Beaft, without any refpite betwixt one and another.-Before the pouring forth of the firft' vial' be ended, the fecond fhall begin, and fo 'the reft". The whole of the angelic oath, relating to 35 Signs of the Times, p. 60, 65. 36 In juftice to Mr. Bicheno it ought, however, to be observed, that he speaks in a far lefs confident tone, than that which many preceding calculators have employed. 37 New Syft. of the Apoc. p. 250. the : the period of the seventh trumpet, which I have alluded to as being copied from Daniel, is thus fublimely expreffed. And the angel which I faw ftand upon the sea, and upon the earth, lifted up his hand to heaven, and fware by him that liveth for ever and ever, who created heaven and the things that are therein, and the earth and the things that are therein, and the fea and the things which are therein, that there fhould be no longer delay 38 but in the days of the voice of the feventh angel, when he fhall begin to found 39, the mystery of God fhould be finished, as he hath declared to his fervants the prophets. By Mr. Pyle a part of this paffage is thus paraphrafed. Having lifted up his hands to heaven, in the fame manner as the angel in Daniel is represented to have done, he, in the name of the Almighty and Eternal Father of all things, protested, that whatever * the faid Daniel, or any other prophet had foretold concerning the kingdom of Christ, and the glorious fuccefs of it here upon earth, in the latter times, fhould be all 'punctually fulfilled. And particularly that part of Daniel's prediction, that the reign of the antichristian kingdom of idolatry and perfecution was to continue, after it is in its full height, but for a time, and times, and a half time (i. e. for 1260 years and no longer), 'fhould be verified in the period of this seventh trum'pet.' With respect to the expreffion, the mystery of 38 Thus Mr. Wakefield tranflates this claufe. In our common translation it is, that there fhould be time no longer. That Xpovos fignifies delay may be seen in the lexicons of Conftantine and Hederic; that it here bears that fignification is the statement of Brightman, of Doddridge, and of Vitringa; and it is observed by Daubuz, that in this place it is thus understood by moft interpreters and versions.' 39 Daubuz renders the words, in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he fhall found the trumpet, the mystery of God shall be finished“; and adds, that the original might have been tranflated, when he shall HAVI founded. 4° X. 5, 6, 7. * XII. 7. God, God, it fignifies, says Vitringa, the oracles of the pro'phets, which interpret the secret will of God;' and it confifts, adds this eminent commentator, of the great concluding events which they foretell; namely, of the remarkable judgments by which the enemies of Chrift's kingdom fhall be destroyed, the establishment of that kingdom throughout the globe, and the confequent univerfal prevalence of virtue and holiness. 6 Whenever the vials begin,' fays Dr. Beverly in his Scripture Line of Time2, they move with fo fwift a 'course, that it is impoffible there fhould be any delay in ⚫ them after they are begun, or that any of them should 'be entered, and not all of them in their order swiftly 'poured out.' It is obferved by Brightman, (a commentator always treated with great refpect by Vitringa,) that the feventh trumpet, which, he fays, has the seven vials for its conflituent parts, should be dispatched in a 'fhort time, and fhould not linger fo long as the former trumpets did, but should fly rather with swift wings 43.' The effects of the feventh trumpet,' fays Mr. Waple, 'fhall not take up any long time in their accomplishing; 'but fhall be performed with speed, and of a sudden; which may perhaps be the meaning of Era Taxo: 'for, as a judicious perfon hath acutely observed, the 'fixth trumpet comes immediately after the fifth, as well as the feventh after the fixth; and therefore it cannot 'be diftinguifhed from the others by its immediate fucceffion, which is common to them all; but by the * speed of its motions and the quickness of its events**.” That the vials will be poured out rapidly, feems to be countenanced by the 8th verfe of the xviiith ch. of St. John, where that prophet, when speaking of the fym t |